Brega Stanislav

“The Moon and Sixpence” by Somerset Maugham

text analysis
William Somerset Maugham was an English playwright, novelist, and short story writer. He
was among the most popular writers of his era and reputedly the highest-paid author during
the 1930s. He achieved commercial success with high sales of books and, accordingly, his
most outstanding works received theatrical productions and film adaptations. An important
factor that may have caused his success is that most of his works were focused on
introducing everyday life and ordinary people into literature. That is why a number of his
novels were based on real people, for example, his masterpiece novel “Of Human Bondage”
or “The Moon and Sixpence”.

The text “The Moon and Sixpence” tells us the story of a man, Mr. Strickland, who
understood that there is a more important thing in life than family love, and that is why one
day, he decides to leave his family. He gets to Paris, where he meets a man sent by his wife
to get her husband back. The man finds that Mr. Strickland was indifferent about his family
and that he wanted to become an artist. His desire to paint became more significant to him
than his love for his family, and that is why he left them.

The theme of “inner urge” runs through the story. The main character couldn’t control his
desire to paint, and that is why he left everything to fulfill his wish. The author’s primary
purpose is to deliver the idea that nothing can stop a human from achieving what he desires.
Even if Mr. Strickland had no talent, he decided to escape from his hindrances (work, family
chores), to become an artist.

The plot is an essential component of the story, which consists of the exposition, the
complication, the rising action, the climax, the falling action, and the denouement. The first
part of the text introduces the characters, The Stricklands that were an average family, the
wife a pleasant, hospitable woman that often gave luncheon parties, and the husband a
hard-working man, but uninteresting as a person, that is why it is the exposition. Then, at the
end of the first part, the text grasps the reader’s attention at once, presenting the main
problem (the complication), Mr. Strickland’s decision to leave his family. At the beginning of
the second part, to create an entertaining plot, Mr. Strickland meets the author, who was
sent by Mrs. Strickland to retrieve his husband as she thought that he left her for another
woman (the rising action). During their discussion, the author finds that Mr. Strickland didn’t
get another woman, but left his family to paint, a statement which created a turning point
(the climax) in the story. After this, Mr. Strickland retells that he wanted to paint since his
childhood and that for the last year he had been going to some classes at night without his
wife knowing this fact (the falling action). The concluding lines (the denouement) represent
Mr. Strickland’s decision not to go back to his wife as his desire to become an artist became
more significant to him than his love for his family.
 Brega Stanislav
The protagonist of the story, Mr. Strickland, is presented as a mysterious person whose
motives are unclear, owing to his unpredictable actions. The text lacks his physical
description however, due to the fact that he said that he supported his wife for 17 years, we
can guess that he is a man in his 35. His friends considered him very quiet and dull, and his
wife thought him to be a perfect philistine, a typical stockbroker, rather boring, however,
despite this, owing to the fact that she was against divorce, the reader can conclude that his
wife loved him because he was a good and kind man. From his dialogue with the author, we
can find that he is a selfish person, as he was indifferent about what others might think of
him, and the only thing he cared for was his desire to paint. Moreover, his responses can also
be proof of his selfish attitude. To author’s questions, Mr. Strickland preferred to answer
with few words (“She’ll get over it”, “Not a bit”, “Let them”, “Of course not”) which not only
shows that he was not even interested in his discussion with the author, but also that he
might have thought of him as a hindrance. All things considered, Mr. Strickland can be
described simply as a rebellious genius who sacrificed family and friends to pursue his artistic
dream.

A similar theme and idea from the text we can find in The Bible. As it is known, The Bible
consists of the Old Testament and the New Testament, which describes the period from
Jesus Christ birth to his death. There, in the New Testament, Jesus gathers his 12 apostles
that had this “inner urge” to follow Jesus’ knowledge. Most of them (like Peter, Andrew,
Philip, Bartholomew, Matthew, Simon, Thaddeus) had families that they left, like Mr.
Strickland, but others (like Jacob, John, Thomas) left their businesses only to become Jesus’
apostle. Like the character in “The Moon and Sixpence”, the apostles knew that they had got
to fulfill their desire (to follow Jesus in this case) as it became the most significant thing in
their lives.

The text teaches us that destiny can conquer anything. Humans can’t transform into a
“Laplace’s demon” to predict what will happen to them in the next moments. That’s why in
our lifetime we should try to manage to be a lot of things in order not to regret the urgent
decisions we might make in the future, that may change our lives completely. I can’t say
much about liking or disliking this text, due to the fact that the authors of the student’s book
left much for guess on the reader’s part, as they included only a part from Somerset’s novel.
However, I think it’s clear that Mr. Strickland stuck to his decision and became an artist in the
end without returning to his family. Taking all things into account I can say that I liked the
theme, idea, and message of the text because they seem somehow unique, but what I didn’t
like is the main character, owing to the fact that his desire didn’t appear spontaneously, as a
cause of something, but rather he just remembered that he couldn’t succeed to paint in his
childhood because of his family’s financial status. To sum it up, “The Moon and Sixpence” is
food for thought, and perhaps it is a good idea to read the whole novel to understand even
more, as the author was a successful one.